A Dream by Noon.

Chapter 22

"Hey! Hold on for a second."

Ryan turned quickly, interested by the urgency in Erika's voice. "What is it?" he asked her.

She stared for a long time, as if she were sizing him up. "What?" he repeated.

"Maybe you can help me." She said finally.

"Help you with what?"

"I think... Well, I'm pretty sure, I know where Sam is."

"What are you talking about?

"There's a thing that can happen at this place. A thing that's happened to me too." She looked around, kicking at dirt and trying to get words out. "People. There's people here. But not here." She looked up, frustrated by what she was trying to communicate. Ryan looked back, equally frustrated, and even more confused. Ryan lifted his arm, palms up and in a question to which he no longer had words. "Uhh." She muttered. She looked right at him and walked closer to him. He could see her eyes now. See her face more clearly, read sincerity and he felt a little more open to listening. She continued walking past him and then turned and mumbled, "follow me Ryan," which he did.

They arrived at the side of the main building, out of view of the driveway. It was getting darker and the shadows that had begun taking the place of the previously sun-soaked structures made him uneasy. He followed Erika through a narrow pass through in between two buildings, not much wider than they were and then stopped halfway through at a stairwell that led down to a lower level of one of the buildings. "Down there." She pointed. Ryan looked and saw nothing. "What am I looking at? What are we doing here? Is Sam okay?" Ryan was starting to get worried that something had happened.

"Maybe, maybe not. But she needs help." Erika continued pointing down to a dark entryway at the bottom of the stairwell. A window in the doorway which was now nearly pitch black was the only way to see inside. "Erika, what?..." he started before she interrupted him, "I'm going to start from the beginning, and when I'm done ask what you want, but remember, time is not on this side of the doorway."

"What the hell does th..."

"I said listen." She interrupted again. "Where we are standing, is also somewhere else. I think everywhere might be somewhere else, but we can access this one here. They set it up that way."

"Who are they?"

She put her hands over her lips to shhh him again. "Not the people who built the hospital years ago, the others. The ones who take people. They put an entrance here. I don't know how long it's been here. Maybe not that long. But now it's here and we have to get Sam before it's gone again." She looked at Ryan to confirm he was still listening and understood the expression on his face, a mixture of skepticism and confusion, but knew he might be the key to helping Sam and so continued. "They are here from somewhere else. Another time or another place. Not ghosts. But they set up these places that are so close to being part of our world, that every once in a while, a person can cross over. And once they convince that person that it's a safe place, a better place. They have them. There's no coming back."

Ryan wanted to speak but didn't know which question to ask first. Or if this was worth asking questions of at all. Maybe Erika was just some crazy girl messing with him. Or maybe she might actually be crazy and believe all of this. He wanted to believe that some magical force had made it impossible for Sam to meet him here tonight but knew that was just his ego thinking selfishly. She paused long enough that he asked, "

"How do you know all of this? And how do you know Sam is... wherever you're saying she is?"

She didn't interrupt him this time but thought about his question for a minute. "Because I've been there." She said finally. "And I almost didn't make it back. But I think it's my fault that Sam is in there. I think I left it open when I left. And without help, Sam probably won't either."